Ask HN: Flag != Downvote, Right? | Hacker News Reader

Ask HN: Flag != Downvote, Right?

22 pointswikiburner15 comments

I'm seeing more and more instances of high quality, relevant submissions that are getting tons of upvotes, and generating very interesting conversations in their comment sections without even a hint of controversy, and then BOOM -- flagged off the front page -- most likely because of a small but very vocal minority who take special exception to a particular story for one reason or another. I'm pretty sure flags aren't intended to serve as downvotes, but that seems to be how they're being used of late, rather than just on spammy, off-topic, inappropriate, inaccurate, abusive, libelous, or frivolous submissions. Is my understanding correct???

This was a pretty interesting bit of investigative journalism that I submitted the other day:

"Dozens of CIA Agents at Benghazi Attack, Being Kept Quiet w/ Monthly Polygraphs (thelead.blogs.cnn.com)"

https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=6152006

and it was definitely relevant to HN given all of the concern of late about abuses by the intelligence community and the "War on Leakers". However, it was flagged to death because the word "Benghazi" has become so politicized that apparently some HNers just read the headline, incorrectly assumed that it was some sort of right-wing talk radio screed, and flagged it without even bothering to click through to the article.

This was an interesting piece of journalism, giving a detailed description of the pressure the intelligence community exerts to silence "potential leakers". The reporter (Jake Tapper) is probably one of the best in the business right now - with a reputation for being very balanced, and on a network with a similar repuation.

This was no Fox News or MSNBC political hit piece.

This problem seems to be getting worse and worse.

UPDATE: And... This was flagged in 10 minutes. Great, The Circle is Complete.

I ran into the character limit, but I just wanted to add some of the patterns I've noticed of stories that tend to get unfairly flagged, although there are plenty of instances where I don't really see any possible explanation for the flagging:

- Stories that could be considered as positive towards Microsoft - Personally, I'm not a big fan of Microsoft, and if there was a Reddit-like downvote for stories, I might consider using it for some of these submissions. But uniformly flagging anything that could be construed as positive towards Microsoft seems quite out of line and petty.

- Political stories or opinions with a Libertarian bent - based on user comments, HN seems to be about 1/3 Liberal, 1/3 Libertarian (with a few conservatives thrown in), and 1/3 moderate/apolitical, but comparable political stories and opinion pieces by Paul Krugman, Matt Taibbi, Ezra Klein, Matthew Yglesias, and other Liberal writers don't seem to run into the same flagging issues that Libertarian ones do.

- Stories that are negative towards Apple - this doesn't seem to happen as much anymore, but was probably one of the best examples of abusive flagging a couple of years ago.

- Political stories in general - I'm sympathetic to HNers who get frustrated when NSA or Aaron Swartz stories completely take over HN, and I'll admit that HN has been a little too politics heavy of late. However, I find it really troubling when HNers openly make comments about how they are "flagging every political story they see". I've witnessed some really interesting submissions and comment discussions get unfairly snuffed out because of this attitude.

I would be curious to hear about any other abusive flagging patterns HNers have noticed, or any opinions on what can be done about it.

I know that there is a thread buried away somewhere for feature requests and that this probably isn't the place for it, but I wish flagging could be more transparent somehow. Maybe with an icon to make users aware that flagging is taking place, and where they could have the opportunity to counter it - or unflag - a submission when they feel that the flagging is abusive?

Your submission was flagged because it's a textbook case of what the guidelines tell you not to submit.

From http://ycombinator.com/newsguidelines.html

"What to Submit

On-Topic: Anything that good hackers would find interesting. That includes more than hacking and startups. If you had to reduce it to a sentence, the answer might be: anything that gratifies one's intellectual curiosity.

Off-Topic: Most stories about politics, or crime, or sports, unless they're evidence of some interesting new phenomenon. Videos of pratfalls or disasters, or cute animal pictures. If they'd cover it on TV news, it's probably off-topic."

You even admit in this discussion that the phenomenon isn't new ('all of the concern of late about abuses by the intelligence community and the "War on Leakers"') and that it would be covered on TV news ('this piece has been picked up and heavily covered by major news outlets everywhere').

If you want to discuss this story, that's great, but HN isn't the place for it.

Gee, you could make the exact same comment about The Guardian's Snowden stories.

If I wanted to read about Benghazi, and who would at this point except a die hard political junkie, I'd go to a site for die hard political junkies.

This is exactly why it got flagged. You didn't bother to even look at the story (or read my comment past the word Benghazi, apparently). It's not a political junkie story, it's an intelligence community overreach and abuse story and a "War on Leakers" story, in the same vein as all of the NSA stories. They are polygraphing around 35 CIA agents monthly and threatening them in order to squelch any possible leaks.

Here are some of the HNer comments from the killed thread, to help illustrate:

wisty 23 hours ago | link

> In exclusive communications obtained by CNN, one insider writes, "You don't jeopardize yourself, you jeopardize your family as well."

> Another says, "You have no idea the amount of pressure being brought to bear on anyone with knowledge of this operation."

I think the implication is pretty clear here.

-----

pgeorgi 23 hours ago | link

"The goal of the questioning, according to sources, is to find out if anyone is talking to the media or Congress."

Media: okay. I can sort of see why. Congress: What the ... are they hiding?

So you assume they are hiding something in Benghazi? (I hear Michelle Bachman and Sarah Paling in my head now screeching the word over and over) From what I read, they are cracking down on leaks in all areas and at all levels of government and military, not just a few agents in the B-word.

Still can't be bothered to read it, huh? Tapper's a really well respected journalist, and this piece has been picked up and heavily covered by major news outlets everywhere. If you can read that article and not have some real concerns about the matter, and not see how it relates to the broader intelligence debates we've been having on HN for the past couple of months, I don't know what to tell you.

This has nothing to do with the Fox News crowd or shrill former politicians, and I think you're betraying your own political biases by refusing to engage with the substance of the matter.

Ok, done. "sources tell us" All hearsay and innuendo. "Then suddenly, there was silence." What is he writing, a spy novel? I thought you said Jake Tapper is a well respected journalist? Is this what garners respect?

An important note is that users don't gain down vote ability until they have ~500 karma, but have the ability to flag stories before that (maybe even at account creation, but I'm not sure).

Not exactly accurate. pg modified the required karma for flagging a few months ago.It's probably over 1000 now.

Nah, I have much less Karma than that and I have "flag" buttons but no downvote buttons.

Probably that change didn't affect newer accounts ?

The meta-topic here (being danced around) is (1) the ability to <downvote articles> does not exist by design; and (2) flagging is an order of magnitude more powerful than a downvote, in reducing the prominence of a discussion. Hence (3) a mis-use of (2) is arguably ~abusive.

How can you tell it was flaggeD?

When I first posted it, it rocketed to the top of the front page right away, then disappeared to a few pages back, then a few minutes later came back to the front page. That indicates that lots of people were upvoting it very quickly, and then other people were flagging it off the front page just as quickly. After it see-sawed like this a handful of times for an hour or so, it was permanently marked [dead]:

https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=6152006

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